The shale oil and gas exploration boom has created intense demand for high-quality sand, from mines such as this one near Brady operated by Frac Tech.

Photo By Courtesy photo

A Unimin Corp. sand mine near Voca in the Texas Hill Country circa 2008. Several more have opened in the area since then, and more are planned.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

The Hill Country boasts some of the most desirable sand, a key to the hydraulic fracturing process: The sand might well find its way to Texas' Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

Sand mined near Brady, Texas at the Frac Tech Services mining operation is washed and sent through a vibration process. Much of the sand produced there is used by the oil and gas drilling industry in areas such as the Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

Sand mined near Brady, Texas at the Frac Tech Services mining operation falls out of a dryer. Much of the sand produced there is used by the oil and gas drilling industry in areas such as the Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

A variety of sand grades and sizes are produced at the Frac Tech Services sand mine near Brady, Texas. The sands have many uses including applications by the oil and gas drilling industries for hydraulic fracturing in areas like the Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

Sand and stone mined near Brady is washed and sent through a vibration and screening process. Much of the sand produced there is used by the oil and gas drilling industry in areas such as the Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

Sand and stone mined near Brady, Texas at the Frac Tech Services mining operation travels up a conveyor belt. Much of the sand produced there is used by the oil and gas drilling industry in areas such as the Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

Sand and mined near Brady, Texas at the Frac Tech Services mining operation travels up a conveyor belt and falls on to a pile. Much of the sand produced there is used by the oil and gas drilling industry in areas such as the Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By JOHN DAVENPORT/jdavenport@express-news.net

Sand and mined near Brady, Texas at the Frac Tech Services mining operation falls out of a chute and into the bed of a truck. Much of the sand produced there is used by the oil and gas drilling industry in areas such as the Eagle Ford shale formation.

Photo By Express-News graphic

James Bode's family has lived in Katemcy, a tiny community in Mason County, for more than 100 years.

His grandfather, Arthur Hurley, donated land for the cemetery and aging clapboard church that sit off U.S. 87.

Sheep graze on the family farm; cattle wander in nearby pastures ringed with live oaks. At night, cicadas buzz loudly under an impossibly bright Milky Way.

That bucolic Hill Country setting, however, is about to change dramatically, as the boom in shale oil and gas exploration reaches far beyond the drilling fields.

An oil field services company bought roughly 200 acres in Katemcy, and now seeks to build a massive sand mining and processing operation across the road from Bode's farm, where he and his sister had hoped to retire.

The rolling fields, which abut about a half-dozen other homes, will give way to a 24/7 operation of regular blasting and glaring lights, as deep pits are carved out of the earth and processed sand is hauled away by dozens of trucks every day.

The silica sand shot through the ancient sandstone formations underlying Mason and adjacent McCulloch counties has become an increasingly hot commodity. Used in the hydraulic fracturing process, the hard, round grains prop open fissures in the shale, allowing the oil and gas to be removed.

The amount of industrial sand used in hydraulic fracturing has quadrupled from 2000 to 2009, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Some sand has been mined in McCulloch County for decades, but as shale drilling has increased exponentially, the search for high-quality sand has become intense — and the Hill Country boasts some of the most desirable.

The Katemcy mine would become the sixth in a roughly 20-mile radius; another is seeking permits in McCulloch, and an eighth mine may be opened in nearby Pontotoc, where 750 acres are about to be sold to an undisclosed company.

Five mines are clustered within a few miles of each other near Voca, in southern McCulloch County, where companies have scraped the topsoil off thousands of acres of land to get at the sand below.

Concerned residents of Pontotoc and Katemcy have mobilized, fearing potential air and water contamination, reduced property values and the loss of a way of life that attracted them to this rugged land settled by German immigrants in the 1840s.

The fight has pitted neighbor against neighbor, as some sell their land at a premium to mining companies. They fiercely defend their right to do so and point to the good-paying jobs and increased energy independence they say the domestic oil and gas boom will bring.

The friction isn't limited to Central Texas. Some residents of Cooke County, north of Denton, are fighting efforts by EOG Resources, a large oil and gas company, to build a mine there. Communities in Minnesota and Wisconsin that also sit atop rich veins of silica are struggling to find a balance between the economic activity the mines generate and protecting their roads, water and air.

Driving the dirt roads around Katemcy where the mine will go — one still carries his grandfather's name — Bode points out neighbors who would also be affected by the proposed mine.

He is sick about the possible changes.

"No more peace and quiet, no more stars in the sky," he said, his truck crunching slowly along the edge of the property.

Coated with sand

For Frac Tech Services LLC, which provides hydraulic fracturing services to oil and gas companies, mining its own sand for shale plays such as the Barnett and the Eagle Ford in Texas and the Haynesville, which stretches east into Louisiana, furthers the company's goal of controlling its supply chain.

By 2008, Frac Tech affiliate Proppant Specialists had acquired 1,200 acres near Voca and begun a major operation there. This year, it bought an adjacent 1,360 acres, some of which will be devoted to a plant that coats sand with resin.

About 60 people work at the Voca mine, spokeswoman Pamela Percival said, and an additional 40 or so will be hired at the resin-coating plant. They are good-paying, full-time jobs with benefits, she said.

Living near the mines, though, can be trying.

Jacque Elliott, who shares a property line with one of two plants owned by Carmeuse Industrial Sands, bought her place six years ago. Blasting operations, which have since stopped, were in full swing.

More than 30 residents have requested a contested hearing from the TCEQ, citing a laundry list of concerns, perhaps most notably over silica dust, which if breathed over a long period can cause silicosis, an ultimately fatal respiratory disease.

Lisa Heath, who lives less than a mile from the proposed plant, is not hopeful. The permitting process, she said, "is a joke, a formality. They don't deny permits."

If the TCEQ grants the hearing, it will be limited to air quality concerns, spokesman Terry Clawson said. Property values, noise, traffic safety and zoning are outside of the commission's jurisdiction.

Proppant has asked the water district for a permit to pump 499 acre-feet per year at the site; that's enough water to serve about 2,000 homes. Residents worry their water quantity and quality could be affected and that the district doesn't have the manpower to properly monitor all the mines.

Manager David Huie said the water district cannot deny a permit but can limit the amount to be pumped. The Katemcy property today allows up to 828 acre-feet a year, he said, for irrigation. The district's board is likely to vote on the permit request Oct. 8.

Proppant, meanwhile, has asked to meet with residents Monday to seek ways to ease their concerns, Percival said.

Water worries

For those in the blink-and-you'll-miss-it village of Pontotoc, water is the biggest concern.

Located on Texas 71 between Llano and Brady, Pontotoc boasts one café, the historic ruins of the San Fernando teacher's acad8emy and a row of turn-of-the-century, hand-hewn sandstone buildings that one landowner is working to turn into a winery, tasting room and live music venue.

Attorney Carl Money grew up in East Texas and doesn't live in Pontotoc full time. But he's restored the Willis House, commissioned in 1872 by the German Emigration Co., and has been growing Spanish-style Tempranillo grapes on the adjacent 5 acres the past several years.

Money is trying to turn the village into a Hill Country destination, but the eastern edge of the land targeted for the sand mine is just a stone's throw away. Who, he worries, will want to sip wine next to a noisy, dusty sand mine?

Pontotoc sits over a fragment of the Hickory aquifer, pinched off from the rest of the formation by a granite outcrop. Connie's Café, the only eatery in town, just had to close up, its shallow well run dry.

"The amount of water to clean all this sand, there are no studies on how it will affect our part of the aquifer," said Money, who has asked the water district to place a moratorium on new permits while it studies the issue.

Huie said he's not sure the district has the authority to do so but is willing to research it. But without a permit request in front of him, he said, "it's all theoretical."

It's not theoretical to Patricia Fleming, who lives with her husband in between the Willis House and the property up for sale. When that and another nearby property are being irrigated, she said, the pressure in her pipes plummets.

"We're afraid they're going to cut off our water," she said, "and we don't even know who it is to go to talk to them about our concerns."

Fleming said she and others are looking into hiring legal representation to guide their fight. She is realistic about their chances to stop the mine but hopes the owners will work to mitigate some of their concerns.

Miller, who along with two others is selling the land in Pontotoc, said he wouldn't do it if he thought it would destroy the village. Like so many families in the area, the Millers have lived and worked the land for generations.

"Listen, it's beautiful and I love it. I made a living off that land. I'm not fired up about having a sand mine," he said. "But I would be a fool not to do what I have the opportunity to do. This deal will help my family for the rest of their lives."

Miller is mostly dismissive of his neighbors' concerns: "Silicosis? Ah, give me a break," he said.

There's plenty of water, he said, though he acknowledged that Pontotoc wells are "terrible" and the aquifer underneath is "pretty marginal."

A real estate agent who markets ranches and other large properties, Miller said that given the interest he's seen from other companies looking for land, the area is likely to see more miners moving in.

Any concessions?

While residents who fear the loss of their way of life gear up to fight new sand mines, others are grateful for the economic activity the existing mines have brought, even as they grapple with the challenges.

They've created perhaps 1,000 good-paying jobs, said McCulloch County Judge Danny Neal, who has watched three new mines open in the past few years, swelling county coffers. But the estimated 500 to 600 heavy trucks a day coming to and from all the mines are tearing up the roads, he said.

County commissioners are now looking to get the sand mining companies to help defray the costs of beefing up the roads.

"It's a challenge, but a good challenge to have," Neal said.

In Greenfield, Wis., residents extracted an agreement from Unimin Corp., which also operates a mine in Voca, to pay the town up to $250,000 a year in user fees, according to news reports.

Neal is talking to other Texas county officials to see what they've done. Early conversations with mine owners, he said, have been positive.

Residents interested in stopping the mines, or at least mitigating the problems, are also looking to see what other communities have done.

Jack Curtis, a manager with Erna Frac Sand, southeast of the Voca cluster, said his company met with residents and ultimately made several concessions. It agreed to drill wells below the shallow water table used by residents, install downward-facing lights and even buy a couple of small properties close to the mine.

It was "a bunch more expensive," Curtis said, "but we were trying to be a good neighbor."